Mortgage fraud flourishes in down markets |
| By Pat Curry
Bankrate.com |
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The current real estate market condition provides
an excellent backdrop for mortgage fraud.
As long as the market stays in the doldrums, mortgage
fraud will continue to thrive, say experts. It can creep into any
neighborhood and hurt not only buyers, sellers and lenders, but
even neighbors.
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Mortgage fraud: |  |
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Buyers trying to
get into the market before interest rates climb much higher
are tempted to cheat to get what they want. |
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Those same rising
rates create financial woes for homeowners with adjustable-rate
mortgages who may be enticed to bend the rules to get
out of bad situations. |
| | Sellers
unable to find ready and financially able buyers may be the unwitting targets
of fraudsters who offer them a way out. | |
Ann Fulmer learned all about mortgage fraud when she found it in her Atlanta neighborhood.
She knew something was fishy when she started noticing unusual activity nearby.
The real estate market in her area had been stagnant
for a while before the 1996 Olympics, says Fulmer. Houses had been
on the market for a time with reduced prices.
Suddenly, houses were bought and resold
in a day for $150,000, $200,000 or even $300,000 more than the asking price. Then
she started noticed that the people who had paid half a million dollars for a
house were showing up, "driving 1972 Pintos and everything they owned in
Hefty bags." Other houses that were sold were never occupied.
A former radio news reporter and criminal prosecutor,
Fulmer may have looked like any other stay-at-home mom, but for
the mortgage fraudsters preying on her neighborhood, she became
their worst nightmare. Bewildered, she started poking around.
"I spent mornings while my kids were at 'mommy's
day out' down at the courthouse," she says. "I started
to see the same name on the deeds."
What she found was mortgage fraud. |